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Schumer to Obama: Pay for terror trials
A leading Democratic senator from New York is planning to ask President Obama to set aside hundreds of millions of dollars that local law enforcement agencies are expected to cost in securing New York City during the trials of several terrorists.
Sen. Charles Schumer (D) said on Monday that a separate line item should be added to the 2011 fiscal year budget, which the White House is scheduled to release in February. Schumer said that if the line was not added to the budget, the funding for the New York Police Department and other state and local law enforcement would have to come from other terror-combating funds, and would “rob Peter to pay Paul.”
The Obama administration announced in November that it planned to have the Justice Department prosecute the self-described mastermind of the September 11, 2001 attacks, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, and four other men suspected of taking part in the attacks, in a federal court blocks from the targeted World Trade Center in lower Manhattan.
“It’s common sense that the federal government pay for security costs because these trials will place a significant burden on the NYPD and the city to keep lower Manhattan safe and secure.”
The move has spurred a furor of partisan rhetoric in Congress, with many Republicans citing security concerns and decrying the trials as public podiums that the suspects could use to incite further terrorist attacks.
Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) referenced the recently attempted attacks on a Northwest flight in Detroit, in which a man with al-Qaeda ties tried to detonate an explosive device while on board.
“The Administration’s response following this attempted attack is consistent with its dangerous decision to close the terrorist prison at Guantanamo Bay and bring Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and other 9/11 terrorists to trial in the United States through civilian courts, rather than the military commissions already in place,” he said last week.
“We know the decision to close this prison has not stopped al Qaeda from plotting attacks on Americans, turning these terrorists over to other countries is not working, and we shouldn’t import them into the United States.”
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